The question at the back of my mind was could we get to Cadwell (around 170 miles), do a full trackday and get back 170 miles. On the journey over from Manchester the night before the car had been well behaved, we'd never done a two & half hour drive before so it was a little daunting in a 22 year old car, but the trackbitch performed well and we passed the first part with ease.
We arrived at the track early having only a short 30 min drive to get there, the track day was a novice day (maximum three previous track days) so we didn't feel too intimidated on our first outing. To our surprise the car park was full of motorbikes, had we turned up on the wrong day? No, MSV had split the day into a bike and car day, fortunately we weren't all going out at the same time, the day was in three sessions, one cars and two bikes every 20 minutes. We eventually found the other cars in a corner of the car park, a complete mix of vehicles, two M3s, an M5, Audi TT RS, Mercedes SLK AMG, Honda S2000, Ford Puma, Leon FR diesel and a MK1 MR2, someone had an older car than ours!
We registered nice and early and then set about our first slightly daunting task, the noise test. The car is quite noisy and whilst we had used an iPhone db meter to measure the noise the week before, they are not very accurate, so we approached the testing bay with a degree of trepidation. It was our turn, we revved to 4.5k revs for the required amount of time, omitting a largish bang when backing off the throttle, the guy said 'you're fine mate', we'd passed, we asked for the reading out of curiosity, 98db against a limit of 105db.
After the obligatory driver's briefing we picked up our helmets and join the crocodile of cars for the sighting laps. These are good for getting use to driving on track and finding your feet at a slower pace, but totally rubbish for giving you the lines (like they are suppose to do), if you're any more than three cars back you've got no chance of following the pace car's lines, as each driver adds their own personal touch to the line, by the time it's got to the back you've got no idea what the line should be. Not to bother it was good to get the trackbitch on track and get a feel for how it would perform.
10.00am arrived, this was the first session of the day out of the seven we'd paid for. We strapped ourselves in nice and tight, I omitted the ball cruncher bottom harnsess and settled for four points, that kept us nice and tight in the car. I was driving the first stint, this was it, the first proper outing in our little, red, 22 year old French hot hatch. I was slightly nervous but having driven Cadwell twice before I was also really keen to see how it would compare to my old 182 Clio and current Megane R26.
They normally tell you to start off slowly and build your speed up throughout the day, I decided to ignore this and go on full attack mode, I quickly built up the speed and soon over took some of the other cars, we then found a nice little gap with no one to bother us. The car felt very good indeed, more stable at high speeds than I anticipated and easier to drive on track than I had expected. We'd had the car tuned on a rolling road but most of the power is only accessible after 4,000 revs so I had expected that driving on track would take a bit more concentration to keep the car in the sweet spot, however the Cadwell track really seemed to work well for us with no forced gear changes, no section where you are required to change up only for a small moment to then have to change down a gear. The brakes also performed well, again a lot better than I had expected, I am sure there are improvements to be made in the future, but for now they are more than adequate. I still lacked some confidence in the high speed corners due to not really knowing what the car can take and also not wanting to roll a 22 year old biscuit tin (we still need to fit that roll cage). The car did however run very hot with the needle showing well over three quarters on the temp gauge, it was a hot day and the car is renowned to run hot but it was a little high, another future upgrade could be cooling. The 20 minutes was soon up, probably for the best as we didn't want to push the car for much longer without checking things out.
The Red Baron on-track at Mansfield corner.
We arrived back in the paddock and gave the car a quick once over, apart from a slighly leaky pipe on the the turbo which was quickly tightened up everything was OK, we'd survived session one.
Session two soon came round and it was time to change drivers, time for a passenger ride. On the way back in from my session, my mate said, 'Out of 100 how much were you pushing then?', I replied 90. I was soon to learn that my 90 was more like a 70. We pulled out of the pit lane and started our session, once again quickly picking off the slower cars and allowing the faster M-Power BMWs to get ahead of us. What then proceeded was a true assault on the track pushing the car to its limits seeing what it really could do, I normally make quite a good passenger but not for the next 20 minutes, I spent most of it pressing a fake brake in the foot well. Once again the car performed very well indeed, comfortably passing an Audi TT RS, Mercedes SLK AMG, Honda S2000 and track setup MX5, the car was punching well above its weight and doing us proud.
On the penultimate lap of the session an M5 had caught us up towards the end of Park Straight too late to be let past, just before Gooseneck we found the M5 on our inside without invitation and decided that it was best to take to the grass to avoid any potential contact, we'd had our first off! At the time I did not know what was going on so was truly terrified when we started heading over the grass towards the tyre wall, however everything was under control and we soon headed back onto the black stuff. Again the car was running very hot by the time the session was over so it was good to get back to the paddock and allow it to cool down.
The Red Baron on-track at Barn corner
We attracted a lot of attention in the paddock, with lots of people interested in the car and our project, the guy in the Audi TT RS was particularly impressed that our £1100 trackbitch could perform so well. The guys in the M5 complemented us on our ability to 'tripod' around the circuit, they said that the back wheel on some corners was cocked at least 10 inches in the air.
Session three started and it was my turn behind the wheel again, the usual cars were soon passed, not sure the guy in the S2000 was particularly impressed with being passed, unlike some of the novices who were quite clearly not pushing their cars to the absolute limit like we were, the person in the S2000 was trying a lot harder but the trackbitch soon got past. Compared to my old 182 Clio and current Megane R26 the 5 seemed just as capable and in some areas more than capable, the Megane has a lot more torque and is a lot easier to drive on track. Both the more modern Renaults had more stability in the corners than the 5, with it appearing to have too much roll (apparent in some of the pictures) so something else that may need attention in the future. The session was just about to end and we were heading down the main start finish straight when a shout to slow down came from the passenger seat, white smoke started to come from the exhaust so I quickly pulled off onto the grass. The car stalled and upon restart a massive plume of white smoke came from the exhaust, it was time to call the tow truck :o(
Luckily the car blew on the last lap of the session, it had dropped no oil on the track so we were quickly towed off the circuit and the bike session was able to start on schedule. The car was allowed to cool down in the paddock before we then tried to diagnose the problem. Every time we started the car, clouds of white smoke poured from the exhaust, it was clear our day was over.
The Red Baron on-track at Barn corner
Due to logistics and other commitments, we chose to take the car to a known local garage to get the car's problem diagnosed, we suspect a head gasket, but until we strip it down we can't say for certain. If it is the head gasket then it'll give us a chance to upgrade it to a higher spec part.
Overall, we were delighted with how the car performed on its maiden track day, holding its own against much more expensive machinery. The wait now goes on to find out what we need to do to fix the car.
